Counting the Omer is so last year (and every year before that). Our new favorite Tumblr takes inspiration from The Wire for the annual countdown between Passover and Shavuot——but not from shady lawyer Maurice Levy. It’s Counting the Omar, and it’s pretty much the best thing that’s ever happened (h/t Miriam Krule).

Behold, an Omar Little quote for each of the 49 days:

Counting the Omar

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When asked about his faith, Detective John Munch (Richard Belzer) says, “The only thing Judaism and I have in common is we both don’t like to work on Saturdays.” Quipping aside, Munch—a cynical, sarcastic, four-times-divorced conspiracy nut—actually has a rich and nuanced, though largely secular, relationship to Judaism.

The character of John Munch is the longest-running one on television to be played by the same actor. He began as a lead on Homicide: Life On The Street as a detective in the Baltimore Police Department and then moved to New York as a Sex Crimes cop on Law And Order: SVU (which occupies the same universe), racking up a current total of 19 seasons of television. Belzer has also appeared as Munch on more series than any other television character, including the original Law And Order and its spinoff Trial By Jury, short-lived UPN cop drama The Beat, The Wire, and The X-Files, comedies 30 Rock and Arrested Development (where Munch helps the FBI run the “scrapbooking sting” on Tobias), and Sesame Street.

But for a character with such longevity, Munch’s complicated relationship to his religion has been sparingly explored. Like Jerry Seinfeld, his Judaism is cultural—he’s oversensitive to perceived anti-Semitism but completely fine with joking about Judaism himself. His sensitivity to personal slights, whether against his religion or not, reaches its logical conclusion in paranoia and an obsession with conspiracy theories. This aspect of the character became less prominent as he moved from Homicide to SVU, but a forensic psychologist in the first season of SVU still pegs Munch as able to “smell a conspiracy theory at a five-year-old’s lemonade stand.”

One of his many crossover appearances suggests Munch might not be so off the mark with his theories. The framing device of “Unusual Suspects,” a Season 5 episode of The X-Files, sees Munch interrogating John Fitzgerald Byers (Bruce Harwood), the leader of the Lone Gunmen—a group of conspiracy nuts more paranoid than Fox Mulder (David Duchovney), another Jew. Within The X-Files, “Unusual Suspects” provides the origins of both the Lone Gunmen and Mulder’s overwhelming fear of the government, but it also helps situate Munch’s persecution complex and surprisingly well-justified distrust of authority.

Still, as much as his attitude reflects a Jewish upbringing, Munch isn’t particularly religious. Homicide’s episode “Kaddish,” the most in-depth exploration of Munch’s faith, makes it clear that although he knows the details of Jewish burial laws, some Yiddish, and a substantial amount of prayer, he wants nothing to do with Judaism. During the episode, Munch refuses to participate in a minyan, a group of 10 Jewish adults required for certain prayers, at a shiva for Helen Rosenthal, a victim whose murder he is investigating who also happens to be his high school crush. At the minyan, Munch claims (while obviously lying) that he doesn’t remember the Mourner’s Kaddish, the hymn of praise to God said by those grieving for a loved one.

Throughout “Kaddish,” we trace young Johnny Munch’s infatuation with Helen. That relationship is important by itself to understanding the adult Munch, but it also lets us peek at his nerdy childhood in the heavily Jewish Baltimore suburb of Pikesville, where he ran a paper route and dreamt of being a detective, “like Johnny Staccato.” Growing up in the suburbs in front of a television, afraid of bullies, it’s easy to trace a line between Johnny Munch and the cynical Sex Crimes cop.

As someone connected to Judaism more through a sort of worldview than through faith, or even rituals, Munch seems to be a kindred spirit of Homeland’s Saul Berenson, another Jewish law-enforcement official who may not be exceedingly religious but takes Judaism as crucial and constitutive of his personality.

Both Munch and Saul experience similar moments confirming their inherent Judaism. Saul says kaddish over Asfal Hamid, a terrorist who has committed suicide, as a way of expressing the compassion that makes him such an effective CIA operative. Likewise, at the end of “Kaddish,” Munch returns to Helen’s shiva, dons a yarmulke, and joins the minyan, the sound of the Mourner’s Kaddish providing the grace note of the episode.

Before he heads back to the shiva, Munch asks his partner why people forget the simple pleasure of holding another person’s hand, clearly pining for the pure love he felt for Helen. The contradiction at the heart of John Munch—the cynical, paranoiac bastard with four ex wives who still believes deeply in true love—is less a signal of the hard-bitten cop’s rejection of Judaism and more a representation of the reluctant Jewish hero, a tradition as old as Moses.

Previously on Network Jews

Dr. John Zoidberg, the Klutzy Jewish Crustacean on Futurama

Jean-Ralphio, the status-obsessed sidekick on Parks and Recreation.

Shoshanna, the scene-stealing afterthought on Girls.

The post Network Jews: Police Detective John Munch on ‘Law & Order: SVU’ appeared first on Jewcy.

For those who have never seen the show, The Wire is auteur David Simon’s holistic meditation on the decay of urban America as seen through various lenses in contemporary Baltimore. Also, if you have not seen the show you should:

1. Stop reading this. I fully admit an obsession with the show, and will imminently spoil the hell out of it in highly technical fashion.
2. Go watch the show. Cease human contact until you are finished.

Back to Levy. He fascinates viewers in part because he seems to revel in amorality—as if he’s the most alive when he’s outfoxing the Major Crimes Unit and Assistant State’s Attorney Rhonda Pearlman. Kostroff may not have invented the shit-eating grin, but in Levy, he damn near perfects it.

Early in the series, Levy exudes a hectoring, schoolmarmish quality that leads to some memorable moments. When Barksdale frontman Orlando gets arrested for buying drugs from an undercover officer, Levy visits him in jail and makes him sign over ownership of the strip club—but not before leaving with this parting shot: “You wanted to be in the game, right? Well, now you’re in the game.” When D’Angelo Barksdale—held without charge—is convinced by Bunk and McNulty to write an apology letter to the made-up family of a murder victim, it’s Levy who steals the scene, barging in, dropping f-bombs, and smacking around Avon’s overmatched nephew.

Yet Levy is not just a skilled lawyer who provides his clients with the best defense possible; on several occasions, Levy actively engages in criminal conspiracy. With Orlando, Levy has the club forfeiture backdated to before the arrest. He later advises Marlo on how to launder money, and Levy probably knows Avon planted the “hot shots”—which killed his fellow inmates—on the corrupt guard in order to engineer his early release. Levy facilitates organized crime purely for personal profit.

That Abe Foxman has probably never watched The Wire is for the best, because through all of Levy’s underhanded dealings, the writers never allow us to forget that he is Jewish. Levy scolds McNulty for pulling him away from his home on a Friday night because “Yvette made brisket.” In one of his many told-you-so speeches, Levy chides Stringer Bell for getting scammed by Senator Clay Davis: “That gonov was born with his hand in someone’s pocket.”

Late in the series, Levy invites Herc for dinner, explaining, “you’re mishpoche now.” Though Jewish viewers may get a thrill from David Simon peppering his scripts with Yiddishisms, Levy’s Judaism is never seriously dealt with. In a story often lauded for the depth and nuance with which it treats its characters, Levy—at least from the perspective of his ethno-religious identity—remains a caricature: he’s a shyster, plain and simple.

Yet the caricatured Judaism is ultimately forgivable because Levy’s purpose—as with so many characters on the show—is to be part of Simon’s revelation and depiction of society’s intractable, systemic flaws. In what is arguably The Wire’s seminal scene, Levy cross-examines Omar during Bird’s trial, attempting to undermine Omar’s credibility as a witness because of his extensive criminal history. As Levy begins fulminating about Omar’s blight on society, Omar interrupts him: “Just like you, man.”

Levy whips around, taken aback, before Omar continues. “I got the shotgun; you got the briefcase—but it’s all in the game though, right?” It is Levy’s one moment of feebleness and shame, and he looks appropriately shell-shocked after trial. Omar’s line is as good a summary of The Wire as any: it is all part of the game, and everyone contributes to society’s endemic failures in his or her own way.

Levy never learns, though. After Marlo walks at series’ end, Levy is positively gleeful. When the other drug kingpins hear of his masterful work, he tells Herc, his client base will expand rapidly. Here again, Levy is the conduit for another of Simon’s subtle critiques: though we may be shown how we contribute to entrenched societal problems, it takes a certain courage to change what is both comfortable and in our narrow self-interest. Levy—like many characters on The Wire—doesn’t have that courage.

(photo credit: The Wire Wiki)

Previously on Network Jews:

Krusty the Clown from long-running animated classic The Simpsons

Annie Edison from NBC’s cult favorite Community

Schmidt from FOX’s breakout hit New Girl

Dov Friedman works in foreign policy in Ankara, Turkey. Like sportswriter Jason Whitlock, he has a childlike obsession with The Wire.

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• Ben & Jerry’s makes charoset ice cream.

• Reduced sodium gefilte fish!

• Sweden has a ‘damn Jew’ problem.

• Monica almost played Rachel on Friends?

The post Daily Jewce: Charoset Ice Cream, Low Sodium Gefilte Fish, and more appeared first on Jewcy.